šØ Tornado Cash co-founder Roman Storm is about to face trial š
In one of the biggest legal cases in the cryptocurrency space, Tornado Cash co-founder Roman Storm is about to go to court. This comes after a U.S. court rejected a motion to dismiss multiple charges against Storm, marking the start of a full legal trial.
Roman Storm and another co-founder, Roman Semenov, were reportedly accused by the U.S. Department of Justice of creating and operating Tornado Cash, a decentralized cryptocurrency protocol accused of providing more than $1 billion in money laundering services to criminals.
Notably, Storm had attempted to avoid a trial by filing a motion to dismiss, claiming that his rights had been violated, but U.S. Judge Katherin Polk Failla of the Southern District of New York rejected his request in a conference call on September 26.
Judge Failla noted that Storm's control of Tornado Cash transactions was not a critical element of conducting a remittance business under Section 1960 of the U.S. Constitution, and that the platform was essentially no different from other remittance services.
Additionally, Judge Failla noted that Stormās defense that the creation of Tornado Cash was a form of free speech was flawed because the First Amendment Bill of Rights does not consider code to be a āfunctionalityā of speech.
Roman Storm is expected to go to trial in New York on December 2, and both he and Semenov face charges of conspiracy to launder money, operating an unregistered money transmission business, and violating the International Economic Emergency Powers Act. If found guilty, they could face a cumulative 45 years in prison.
Roman Storm has been detained by the Department of Justice since his arrest in August 2023, while his other partner Semenov is still at large. Meanwhile, Tornado Cashās third co-founder Alexey Pertsev was sentenced to five years in prison by Dutch authorities in 2022.
š¬ What do you think of Roman Stormās upcoming trial? What impact does this case have on the cryptocurrency space and the future of decentralized finance (DeFi)? How do you think cryptocurrencies should balance privacy rights and legal compliance?
